To the Editor:
In “White House Bill Proposes System to Try Detainees” (front page, July 26), we see radically different conceptions of what constitutes a “fair process” for enemy combatants. The administration wants a system that leads to convictions of Muslim extremists; military supporters, however, want a system that ensures full detainee rights, in case it is used against American soldiers abroad. But partisans are rarely fair.
The solution is to craft a set of rules from behind what the philosopher John Rawls describes as a “veil of ignorance.” We must generate the rules without knowing whether they will be applied to Muslim extremist or United States marine; only then will we be sure that they are truly just.
Kevin M. Carlsmith
Hamilton, N.Y., July 27, 2006
The writer is an assistant professor of psychology, Colgate University.
Note from AnalPhilosopher: Carlsmith knows just enough philosophy to be dangerous. "Muslim extremists" such as Osama bin Laden and other members of al Qaeda are nonstate actors who violate the Geneva Convention by (among other things) not wearing uniforms. United States Marines wear uniforms and otherwise comply with the Convention. This morally relevant difference means that the same principles or rules need not apply. To put it technically, Rawls's theory requires ignorance of morally irrelevant facts (such as, in most contexts, skin color); it does not require ignorance of morally relevant facts.